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Humber still trying to process perfection

Humber still trying to process perfection

SEATTLE -- Less than 24 hours after Philip Humber entered the record books, the player that aided in the final out by swinging at a full-count slider in the dirt still can't believe it.

"I'm thinking he's got to throw a fastball," Mariners infielder Brendan Ryan said. "There's no way he's going to want to take a chance and walk me on the last pitch. No chance. I'm staying on the fastball, 100 percent. There's no way he's throwing the slider. And he threw the slider. I cannot believe he threw the chase slider there."

On the other hand, Humber is still trying to wrap his head around the greatest individual accomplishment he's achieved in his professional career. It was just the second start of the season for the right-hander, after his spot was skipped in the rotation earlier in the year because of a rain delay.

The ever-humble Humber said Sunday morning he received a mass influx of calls and texts following the perfect game. And even though there were easily over 100 texts in his inbox, he replied to every single one.

"I didn't get to call as many people as I would've liked to, but I got to text most everybody," he said. "At least let them know I got their messages and I appreciated it.

"It's just really neat, there's a lot of people I hadn't heard from in a long time, and a lot of people I wanted to hear from, maybe didn't have their number, stuff like that. But somehow they got in touch with me and were able to be a part of it. It was just fun to be able to share it with some people that had impacted my life and my career to this point."

One of those people that reached out to Humber was Mark Buehrle, who sent the righty a text immediately following Saturday's game. The former White Sox pitcher is the owner of both a perfect game and a no-hitter, and was a mentor of sorts to Humber last season.

"Actually, I probably need to ask him, there are some things that I don't know exactly how I'm going to handle," Humber said. "He's been through it before, and so I want to definitely use him."

It'll be a relief for Humber to find out what parts of the historic game should be sent to the Hall of Fame and what he gets to keep. He presumes the game ball will be one of the items sent to Cooperstown, and to avoid the risk he'd lose it or play catch with it, he gave it to clubhouse manager Vince Fresso. But as far as other mementos, he'll take it all.

"Hopefully I get to keep as much of it as I can," Humber said. "I doubt I'll throw one again, so it would be nice to have as much to remember it by as I can."